Verb Types(125) a he lived right near a mountain
b *he took right off his hat
(126) a he lived near the forest and next to a river
b *he took off his hat and off his coat
Much of this evidence seems to suggest that the preposition does not act as the
head of a preposition phrase, but forms a unit with the verb. For example, while (124a)
shows that the PP complement of a verb can be moved to the front of the clause, it
seems that the particle plus the following DP cannot be moved (124b), indicating that
it is perhaps not a constituent. Moreover, as we have seen in (125a) a PP can be
modified by an adverb like right, but this is not possible for the particle followed by a
DP (125b). Finally, we can coordinate a PP complement with another PP (126a), but
we cannot coordinate the particle plus the following DP with a PP, indicating that the
particle does not form a PP with the following DP. For this reason, it is often claimed
that the particle forms a syntactic unit with the verb, perhaps being adjoined to it:
(127) V'
V DP
V P the answer
find out
However, it should also be observed that the verb and the particle do not seem to
behave like a complex verb and in a number of ways, the verb is still independent of the
particle, which would not be expected if (127) were the correct analysis. For one thing, the
verb bears all inflections, and these are not stuck onto the end of the phrasal verb itself:
(128) a faded out fade outed
b fading out fade outing
c fades out *fade outs
From the other side of things, the particle seems independent of the verb, in that it
can move separately from the verb, as already pointed out in (123), but demonstrated
again here:
(129) a he looked up the word he looked the word up
b she held up the bank she held the bank up
c they put off the meeting they put the meeting off
A final problem for (127) is that it tends to go against the general pattern of
compounding in English. When a complex head is formed from two heads by
adjoining one to the other, it is generally the case that the head of the compound is the
leftmost element. This is true in compound nouns and adjectives, but also with verbs:
(130) a armchair, milk jug, family film, white lie, etc.
b dark brown, ice cold, rock hard, squeaky clean, etc.
c outdo, undercut, overspend, over wrap, dry clean, etc.